Elvis may or may not be dead, but his cook definitely is. Her passing has been recorded with a substantial obituary in the New York Times. Mary Jenkins Langston, who died in Memphis, Tennessee, aged 78, spent 14 years cooking for Elvis at Graceland. She served king-sized helpings of his favourite dishes such as cheeseburgers, chicken-fried steaks, hamburger steaks and family-size bowls of banana pudding.
Ms Langston said in a BBC documentary called The Burger And The King: "He said that the only thing in life he got any enjoyment out of was eating. And he liked his food real rich."
So rich that when she brought him his breakfast he would say "This is good, Mary." And "he'd have butter running down his arms". Breakfast was home-made scones fried in butter, sausage patties, four scrambled eggs and sometimes fried bacon. Elvis liked his food prepared lightning fast, and Ms Langston would race to his bedroom from the kitchen as soon as it was cooked.
She dismissed as a myth that Elvis liked burnt bacon sandwiches. But "he liked his bacon very crisp". Elvis liked her cooking so much that he bought her three cars and a three-bedroom home. She wrote a book about her experiences called Memories Beyond Graceland Gate.
The wood-panelled kitchen where she cooked these heart-stopping feasts was added to the Graceland tour in 1995 and Ms Langston returned for the occasion.
She started working for him in 1963 as a maid but was promoted to cook when his new bride, Priscilla, arrived three years later. The two women had similar tastes for home-style beef and vegetable dishes. After Elvis died in 1977, Ms Langston stayed on as cook for the family for another 12 years.
Her biggest challenge was trying to cook Elvis's favourite snack after a tour, fried peanut butter and banana sandwiches. Elvis kept rejecting her efforts until his father, Vernon, suggested toasting the bread before putting it in the pan.
This worked, but it meant using 1/2 lb of butter for every three sandwiches. "It'd be just floating in butter," Ms Langston reminisced at an Elvis commemoration. "You'd turn it and turn it and turn it until all the butter was soaked up. That's when he liked it." Slurp.